I hope that the vote for democracy outweighs the vote for chaos, and that peace prevails, Yael. I know it's a coin toss election, but I still feel that those who prefer the messy conventions of democracy outnumber those who want a new Caesar to take the reins. We'll see.

I have another hope, too. I hope that half of our fellow citizens don't really want an authoritarian state and don't really hate their neighbors. (Some do, yes, but in my dream that percentage is 10% or less.) Instead, they want to belong to something, and this conspiracist nativist movement has given them a feeling of belonging and meaning. If they can find it in truth and reality and compassion and efforts to create a common good, they'll abandon not only the movement but even the rhetoric. There will always be violent, hate-filled, anti-government conspiracists (remember Timothy McVeigh?), but I hope for a civic environment that discourages their voices and evokes, in Lincoln's beautiful phrase, "the better angels of our nature."

Thanks for being a voice of honesty and reasoned argument. I hope you feel fewer reasons for fear in the coming days and weeks.